What the exam asks
- Interpret gel banding patterns to deduce fragment sizes, genotypes, paternity, forensic matches or the success of restriction digests.
- Explain how PCR selectively amplifies a target DNA sequence and predict how experimental errors (such as missing primers or heat-sensitive polymerase) affect output.
- Analyze bacterial transformation experiments, identifying controls and explaining why specific agar plates show lawn growth, isolated colonies or no growth.
- Connect sequencing and molecular data to broader biological concepts like mutation, gene expression (e.g., cDNA vs. genomic DNA) and evolutionary relatedness (Unit 7).